What can we learn from it?

Part 3



Part 4





Part 5





Part 6

Part 2

How soon we forget!

Would you meet diplomatically with these countries' leaders?

The New York Manifesto

Columbia University Protest Organizers issue the New York Manifesto

Following the successful demonstration staged against the visit of the Ethiopian dictator to Columbia University, the organizers of the protest from New York, D.C. area, and other north-eastern states issued the attached Manifesto.

In the coming few days and weeks, there will be extensive discussion on each of the three items constituting the Manifesto. We encourage all pro-democracy individuals and groups to participate in the discussions using all available forums and media, including the popular Websites, radio, focus groups, etc.

WHEREAS, On September 22, 2010, Ethiopians in the Diaspora staged an extraordinarily successful demonstration against the invitation of Meles Zenawi to Columbia University in the City of New York; and

WHEREAS, in the days leading to the said demonstration, there was a manifestation of unsurpassed unity among the democratic forces; and

Jamaica's Financial Crisis, What Can We Learn?

Part 1

Hodams desert Meles

Today’s event at Columbia University was a huge disaster for Woyanne. In having Meles Zenawi invited to the University to give keynote address on African leadership, his supporters intended to revive his image that has been soiled with the blood of innocent Ethiopians and fraudulent elections. Instead, the Columbia invitation helped expose not only Meles, but also his backers, including a couple of American professors who like to kiss up to third world dictators.
Cancel your Debt!2 Simple Steps to Reduce Debt!Over $10k in credit card debt? Legally eliminate up to 70% of what you owe! (Left: Meles supporters holding Woyanne flag at Columbia)

As Ethiopians prepared to march to Columbia, the Woyanne-occupied Ethiopian mission in New York had worked full time to get as many supporters of Meles Zenawi as they could. They even had Solomon Tekalign flown all the way from Atlanta. Their effort did not bear fruit. In fact, it compounded the problem since no more than a couple of hodams participated in the pro-Meles demonstration, exposing his narrow support base. There were about 50 demonstrators, and 48 of them were Tigreans. It is reported that some of them were security guards who flew with Meles from Addis Ababa.



The fact that 99 percent of the pro-Meles demonstrators today were Tigreans doesn’t mean that all Tigreans support Woyanne. There might be more than 50 Tigreans who joined us at the anti-Woyanne demonstration, and some of the protest organizers themselves are Tigreans. What it shows is that Meles has no real support outside of the Tigrean ethnic group. Even among Tigreans, his support seems to be narrow. And hodams are not willing to show their face at a pro-Woyanne event after the August 3 Woyanne-sponsored demonstration fearing that their photos will be plastered all over the Internet again.

To make up for their lack of number, the pro-Meles demonstrators brought a bunch of drums and were singing Tigrigna songs until they were drowned out by the over 700 pro-democracy protesters on the other side of the street.


Think You Don't Have Time For School? You Do!

 The photo on the left shows Dr Awash Teklehaimanot and another Woyanne trying to relax near the Columbia campus after what turned out to be a disastrous day for them. Awash is thought to be the person who has worked behind the scene to have Columbia invite Meles.

Columbia president fails to attend Meles speech

Ethiopia’s brutal despot gave a short speech today at Columbia University, which was followed by 20 minutes of questions and answers. The whole program took less than 1 hour.




The University’s president, Lee Bollinger, did not show up at the meeting. Instead, Meles was introduced by his cheerleader Prof. Joseph Stiglitz.

The discredited professor, as expected, talked about Meles Zenawis’ achievements before inviting him to speak. But even Stiglitz was too timid to talk about Meles today. His remarks lasted only 2 minutes.

The meeting was attended by less than 50 individuals, while over 700 Ethiopians protested outside the University campus… more update later


ETHIOPIANREVIEW

ICG’s report besieged with bias and distortions

                                                                           ICG

Sophia Tesfamariam

ERITREA: ICG’s report besieged with bias and distortions


On 21 September 2010, the International Crisis Group (ICG) released a report on Eritrea. Even though the report’s authors were not named, the title chosen for the report, and the all too familiar buzz words used throughout the over 30 page long report, the timing of the report, and the references provided are telling enough of who its sources are, and the real motives behind the shameful distorted report. Having just returned from a two month long trip to Eritrea along with thousands of Eritreans from the Diaspora who participated in the 4th Annual Youth Festival in Sawa, and who traveled throughout the country to witness Eritrea's incredible and impressive development, I am surprised by the ICG report as it does not jive with the realities in Eritrea as I know it-or saw it-up close.



The ICG believes that by providing the Government of Eritrea with an advance copy, it would somehow make its report a balanced one. It doesn’t. The report would have been more balanced had the ICG provided the views and opinions of the vast Eritrean Diaspora and the Government of Eritrea, instead of acting like loyal stenographers for bankrupt individuals and groups who have aligned themselves with high profile political personalities (former members of US and European governments) with access to various forum’s such as opendemocracy, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International etc. etc. to malign the government and people of Eritrea for the last 12 years. ICG’s bias is clear and consistent throughout the report and makes me wonder what the point is in releasing such an unbalanced, one-sided, and diversionary report at this time.

Credibility of International Crisis Group Questioned

An OEA Statement


September 21, 2010

ICG Report Leaves No Misinformation on Eritrea Unturned

If there is anyone--from among those who don’t wish Eritrea and the Eritrean people well—who has been waiting to see in one place all the avalanche of misinformation and disinformation, and straight out lies produced and disseminated by the TPLF, its lobbyists collaborators as well as its supporters the last decade and half, wait no longer; it has come out in the form of the latest International Crisis Group (ICG) report on Eritrea which leaves no misinformation of the last decade and half on this former Italian colony unused. It is a compilation of almost everything said or written to demonize Eritrea and its people and undermine their sovereignty since 1998 when the TPLF and its collaborators began to produce tons and tons of misinformation on the nation in a vain attempt to achieve what they couldn’t achieve militarily in the border war. When you mix, blend, and marinate this pile of vile in a pseudo-analysis designed to accentuate the negative,

you get the latest ICG report on Eritrea, a 37-page document tightly packed with misinformation widely disseminated in the past.

What is even more disappointing is that this full-throttle attempt to vilify this young African nation is coming at a time when the world, from the UN Secretary General on down, is commending this young African nation’s which is still trying to recover from 40-years of war with Ethiopia. Just recently, Eritrea and Djibouti signed a peace agreement negotiated by the Government of Qatar to resolve their border dispute. Other organizations praising Eritrea’s actions to bring about stability in the region are: the European Union and the African Union.

What is also dismaying is that the ICG was expected to use its resources and reach to contribute to the discourse on the search for peace in the Horn, instead it has come out with a pile of misinformation unprecedented in its magnitude and its hostility towards the nation--misinformation that is likely to warm the hearts of those who don’t want to see peace in this peace-starved region of Africa. This is not the work of a group that tries to be objective, balanced and fair in its approach. This in fact disqualifies this crisis group from being considered as a legitimate, credible actor in the search for peace in the troubled Horn of Africa or any other crisis-ridden area.





Organization of Eritrean Americans – (OEA)

Crisis Group's Latest Report on Eritrea: Garbage In, Garbage Out

Ghidewon Abay Asmerom

GIGO" as an abbreviation for "Garbage In, Garbage Out" is a common phrase among computer programmers. It illustrates the fact that "computers will unquestioningly process the most nonsensical of input data (garbage in) and produce nonsensical output (garbage out)." This is exactly what the latest
Crisis Group report on Eritrea did. Despite a semblance and camouflage of professionalism, it is a report that has recycled refuse that has been out in the dumpster for the past nine years.

One doesn't have to go further than the footnotes to see the source of the trash. It is the same rubbish that was previously collected at the waste receptacles called the Chatham House, the Red Sea Press, the Oslo Center, or an exclusive conference in Belgium. Any genuine analyst would have immediately realized that the collection was meant for shipment to a landfill, not for use in a high-caliber analysis. However, not to the judgment of ICG analysts "in another capacity!" They have chosen to package it afresh hoping the junk will stick better this time around.

Columbia’s invitation to Zenawi sparks outrage

Throughout the week, the World Leaders Forum will bring heads of state from around the world to address Columbia.

But as far as controversy goes, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi tops the list.

By Amber Tunnell, Columbia Spectator

Zenawi -- who has allegedly intimidated voters at polls, detained political opponents, and been labeled by the New York Times as an example of “autocratic repression" -- is set to appear at Low Library on Wednesday to give a talk on “The Current Global Environment and its Impact in Africa.”

Many people, on and off campus, have spoken out against his invitation.

“He’s supposed to be a spokesman on African leadership, and I think that’s absurd because he’s not,” said Haben Fecadu, a student in the law school and vice-chair of the African Law Students Association.

7.5 million acres of fertile Ethiopian land to be leased away

The Oakland Institute has released a report titled (Mis)Investment in Agriculture: The Role of the International Finance Corporation in the Global Land Grab, which points out that more than 13 million Ethiopians are in need of food aid, “but paradoxically the government is offering at least 7.5 million acres of its most fertile land to rich countries and some of the world’s most wealthy individuals to export food back to their own countries.”

The 59-page report explains:


…the leasing of farmland has increased dramatically in Ethiopia the past three years. In what has been called Ethiopia’s great “land lease project”—in an effort to introduce large-scale commercial farming to the country—the government is offering up vast chunks of fertile farmland to local and foreign investors at almost giveaway rates. By 2013, three million hectares of idle land is expected to have been allotted, equivalent to more than one fifth of the current land under cultivation in the country.

The report quotes a journalist describing his experience in Awassa, southern Ethiopia:

The farm manager shows us millions of tomatoes, peppers and other vegetables being grown in 1,500 foot rows in computer controlled conditions. Spanish engineers are building the steel structure, Dutch technology minimizes water use from two bore-holes and 1,000 women pick and pack 50 tons of food a day. Within 24 hours, it has been driven 200 miles to Addis Ababa and flown 1,000 miles to the shops and restaurants of Dubai, Jeddah and elsewhere in the Middle East.

Imports push up prices for Djibouti's poor

Awash Teklehaimanot – a dictator’s agent at Columbia

When many of us learned about Columbia University’s invitation to dictator Meles Zenawi to give a keynote address on “leadership,” it was not difficult to figure out who were behind it — Sachs and Stiglitz, two American professors who exhibit passionate affection toward some of the world’s despicable tyrants, particularly Ethiopia’s bloodthirsty dictator Meles Zenawi. As it turned out, it was these two professors who have convinced Columbia’s president Lee Bollinger to extend the invitation to Meles.

Shocking Discovery for Joint ReliefHow to Relieve your JointsShocking discovery by Cambridge researchers for amazing joint relief. Click here to learn more...But that is not the whole story. How did these two professors come to know Meles Zenawi? The answer is Prof. Awash Teklehaimanot, who works for Columbia University as Director of Malaria and NTD Program, and also for Meles Zenawi’s regime as Director of the Center for National Health Development in Ethiopia.

Before Prof. Awash’s friends and relatives — Woyannes — came to power, malaria had ceased to exist in Ethiopia through the efforts of Ethiopian Malaria Prevention Center. When Woyannes came to power, they dismantled the Center and took every thing to Tigray. A few years later, Malaria returned to Ethiopia and now it is killing tens of thousands of people every year.

Prof. Awash holds the title “Director of the Center for National Health Development in Ethiopia,” however, every foreign assistance he manages to obtain in the name of Ethiopia goes to Tigray.

As a loyal and prominent member of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (Woyanne), Prof. Awash also works to promote Meles Zenawi’s agenda in the U.S. academia by introducing him to the likes of Prof. Sachs, who is his long-time mentor. The current Minister of Health in Ethiopia and politburo member of the ruling Tigray People Liberation Front, Tewodros Adhanom, was Awash’s student. When ever Meles goes to New York, one of the few Ethiopians he meets with is Awash Teklehaimanot. The other one is his investment adviser Kassahun (Kassy) Kebede, Managing Partner of Panton Capital Group, LLC (more about this guy another time).

Awash Teklehaimanot also worked behind the scene to arrange former president Clinton’s August 2008 visit to Ethiopia.

In 2004, Awash arranged a visit by Columbia University president Lee Bollinger to visit Tigray.

Columbia President Lee Bollinger (center) visited the village of Abraha Astebha in the Tigray region of Northern Ethiopia in July, 2004, along with Earth Institute health expert Awash Teklehaimanot (far left) and members of the Hunger Task Force of the United Nations Millennium Project. Jean Magnano Bollinger, President Bollinger's wife, is standing to his left. Second to his right is Dr. Mitiku Haile, President of Ethiopia's Mekelle University and a soil expert.




Awash did not take Bollinger for a visit to southern, western or any other region during their stay in Ethiopia.

The Woyanne junta has many individuals through out the U.S. who work behind the scene to promote Meles Zenawi’s ethnic apartheid program in Ethiopia where every thing is controlled by one ethnic group.

It is up to Ethiopians to expose these bigots so we can challenge and confront them where ever they are in order to minimize the damages they are doing in Ethiopia.

Please post in the comment section below any further info you have about this Woyanne aparthied professor and others like him.


EthiopianReview

Ethiopia: Endless Campaign of Disinformation

Eritrean Foreign Ministry Press Release: Ethiopia: Endless Campaign of Disinformation

In the last issue of its bulletin, “Week in the Horn”, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ethiopia, falsely alleges that Eritrea provided “a plane load of weapons and medical supplies to Al-Shabaab in Kismayo… at the same time as President Isaias was talking to Mr. Pascoe ( the UN Under Secretary-General for Political Affairs) and Ambassador Mahiga”, ( the Special Representative of the Secretary-General to Somalia). The statement goes further to claim: “about thirty wounded Al-shabaab fighters, including five foreigners, were then loaded onto the plane flown back to Asmara… An Eritrean official who flew down from Asmara in the plane also traveled to Afgoye to meet with Sheik Aweys.” To give a semblance of “credence” to these preposterous accusations, the Ministry attributes the story to anonymous “sources close to Al-Shabaab.”


This is not the first time the Foreign Ministry’s weekly bulletin is peddling propaganda against Eritrea. For reasons better known to Ethiopia, the misinformation campaign seems to have increased in the past few weeks with a litany of lopsided editorials on the well-known rulings of the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission, the Qatar mediation process, as well as innuendos and outright lies on the visits of foreign dignitaries to Eritrea. Dignifying these malicious distortions and/ or groundless accusations with responses will not serve any purpose and Eritrea has not bothered to address them.

The timing and intent behind this “Al-Shebaab” story has, however, two dimensions that must be addressed to put the record straight. Ethiopia Foreign Ministry has fabricated this story this week precisely in order to misinform and wrongly influence the Somalia Monitoring Group that is touring the Horn of Africa region and who arrived in Asmara this Sunday (Septmebr 12). The other probable reason might have to do with Ethiopia’s desire and pending plans to intervene again in Somalia. Indeed, when Ethiopia invaded Somalia in December 2006, to oust the UIC of the same Sheik Sherif that was then accused of extremism and is now embraced as “moderate”, one of the pretexts it peddled was Eritrea’s deployment in Somalia of 2000 troops. Unfortunately, this total fabrication was not properly verified at the time and recycled as truth even by the Somalia Monitoring Group. We see now the same tape being played again.

In conclusion, as Eritrea has repeatedly explained, the crises in Somalia can only be solved through an all inclusive political peace process. Ethiopia’s repeated and failed invasions of Somalia and other political machination to keep Somalia weak and fragmented have not only proven futile but become a source of the problem rather than its solution. Ministry of Foreign Affairs Asmara 15 September 2010

Columbia University promotes blood thirsty tyrants (video)

Columbia University posted the following statement about Meles Zenawi and later removed it after receiving complaints from angry Ethiopians:

Under the seasoned governmental leadership of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, now in his fourth term, and vision of the Tigrai Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) and Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), Ethiopia has made and continues to make progresses in many areas including in education, transportation, health and energy.

Woyanne replaces Ethiopian Airlines CEO with one of its own

The TPLF-junta controlled Ethiopian News Agency (ENA) reported today that Ethiopian Airlines CEO Girma Wake has been replaced by Tewolde G. Mariam.

The news doesn’t indicate why Seyoum Mesfin, chairman of Ethiopian Airlines’ board, decided to replace Girma, who has been a successful CEO.

Up to now, Ethiopian Airlines has been one of the few major institutions in the country who has not been run by a Woyanne Tigrean. The ethnic apartheid regime will not rest until nothing left in the country that is not controlled by one party and one ethnic group.

Tewolde G. Mariam is a relative of Seyoum Mesfin and is said to be a hard core Woyanne who has been preparing himself take over Ethiopian Airlines by working under Girma Wake as chief operating officer.

EthiopianReview

Ethiopia’s tyrant to give a speech at Columbia University in NY

Columbia University in New York has invited Ethiopia’s genocidal dictator Meles Zenawi to give a speech on September 22, 2010.

The brutal dictator is asked to give a keynote address “on the topic of Ethiopia and African Leadership.”

Click here for more info. Contact: Email cgtmail@gmail.com; Tel (212) 851-7293

The University’s web site says this about Meles:

Under the seasoned governmental leadership of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, now in his fourth term, and vision of the Tigrai Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) and Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), Ethiopia has made and continues to make progresses in many areas including in education, transportation, health and energy. – Source



It’s unbelievable that such a description about one of the world’s most vicious, corrupt, incompetent tyrants is posted on a prestigious American university’s web site. Only a hired lobby firm such as DLP Piper can come up with such a lie. The truth is that under Meles Zenawi and his tribal TPLF junta, most Ethiopians not only live in abject poverty, they are also being brutalized and systematically starved.



This invitation is a cruel insult against Ethiopians who are being brutalized by the fascist dictator.



Columbia University may not know who Meles Zenawi really is, so this is a good opportunity for Ethiopians around the world to educate them.



Lee C. Bollinger, President, Columbia University

Phone: (212) 854-9970; Fax: (212) 854-9973

Email: officeofthepresident@columbia.edu



University Programs and Events

Office of the President

Columbia University in the City of New York

202 Low Library, 535 West 116th Street, New York, NY 10027



Tel: +1-212-851-7421; Fax: +1-212-851-7410

Email: worldleaders@columbia.edu


EthiopianReview

Oil-dependency and food: Livelihoods at risk

By Tanya Kerssen

 Tanya Kerssen explores how the ‘global pursuit of fossil fuels’ is impacting on communities across oil-rich regions in Africa, and the prospects for food and fuel sovereignty in a world without cheap oil. ‘Ironically, those with the smallest ecological footprint on earth have born the highest cost,’ writes Kerssen, but these ‘beleaguered people – the small farmers, herders, fishers and artisans of the world – could hold the key to a more energy-efficient future.’

The high cost of cheap oil was brought abruptly to light last April when Transocean’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig (contracted by BP) exploded 40 miles southeast of the Louisiana coast, causing one of the worst environmental disasters in US history. Lost amidst the speechifying and PR, however, have been the voices of those directly affected: The thousands of families who inhabit some of the world’s richest fishing grounds. Louisiana is the largest supplier of domestic seafood in the continental United
States, providing shrimp, blue crab, oysters, crawfish and a variety of marine finfish[1]. For the primarily African-American fishing towns South of New Orleans – struggling for decades to compete against large fishing operations and hit hard by Katrina – the BP spill portends the loss of a traditional, and sustainable, way of life on the water: ‘Take a look out there,’ offered 71-year-old retired oysterman Roger Moliere to the New York Times, ‘See what they’re doing? Sitting, talking, nobody working…Was a time if a man lost his job he could always come down to the bayou and feed his family. But this here, what you got happening now, this here might finish us off.’[2]

Three meals a day

The Woyanne junta leader Meles Zenawi had promised 3 meals a day for every Ethiopian 15 years ago, October 1995. Today, 15 million Ethiopians are facing starvation and Ethiopia continues to be one of the poorest nations in the world, mainly due to maladministration and corruption on the part of the Woyanne mafia that is ruling Ethiopia. Watch the video below:

The unceremonious dismissal of Sibhat Nega

The biggest loser in this week’s reshuffle inside the TPLF top leadership is the 72-year-old Sibhat Nega, who was a one-time chairman and most powerful person inside the tribal organization that is currently ruling Ethiopia.

The media that is under the control of Meles reported that Sibhat was not re-elected due to his age, which is far from the truth.

The reshuffle took place at Tigray People Liberation Front’s (TPLF) 10th conference in Mekele this week.

The feud between Sibhat Nega and Azeb Mesfin, the wife of Meles Zenawi, came out in the open about a year ago when she managed to force him out of EFFORT, a conglomerate of 60 corporations, to make a space for herself. That was followed by his ouster from the TPLF politburo. He expressed his displeasure publicly about his forced resignation when he was interviewed by VOA in June 2009

Ethiopian Birr lost 16 percent of its value over night

An Ethiopian financial expert says:
There are two implications of this devaluation.

1- It makes the country’s exports relatively less expensive for foreigners — a win for Foreigners.

2- It makes foreign products relatively more expensive for domestic consumers — a lose for Ethiopians. This will have immense detrimental impact on the general population. It is the same as taking a 20% immediate pay cut for any fixed income earner. Inflation is going to skyrocket. Prices of imported goods will soon be about double. Prices of domestic products (including agricultural) will also increase as the government is encouraged to export more. Interest rates will consequently rise to control inflation which, intern, will result in slower economic growth.

(Reuters) — The Ethiopian birr was devalued by 16.7 percent on Wednesday, according to exchange rates published on the central bank’s website.

The birr was quoted by the National Bank of Ethiopia at a weighted average of 16.3514 against the dollar compared with 13.6284 on Tuesday. A central bank official confirmed the new rate but was not authorised to make further comment.

Last month, the government unveiled an ambitious five-year economic plan which targets average annual economic growth of 14.9 percent over the period and aims to end the Horn of Africa nation’s dependence on food aid